


Super Awesome Magical Light-Up Fairy Shoes

by hoosierbitch



Series: sneakers and sheriff badges [3]
Category: White Collar
Genre: Angst, F/M, Gen, Kid!Fic, Queer Character, Schmoop, light-up sneakers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-15
Updated: 2013-06-15
Packaged: 2017-12-15 03:21:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,467
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/844708
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hoosierbitch/pseuds/hoosierbitch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For as long as Neal has known that he is different, he has known that it is a bad thing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Super Awesome Magical Light-Up Fairy Shoes

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings: Implied child abuse and neglect, homophobia and internalized homophobia.
> 
> Notes: This was written for wickhouse2005, who left me a wonderful prompt!
> 
> Thanks: Giant thanks to neontiger55 and embroiderama for the wonderful beta. And thanks, as always, to ivorysilk, who is a kind and benevolent overlord, and is the reason why the kid!fic ‘verse exists.

When Peter finally finds them again, they're in the shoe department. "We've narrowed it down to a few final contestants," Elizabeth whispers, nodding at the row of shoes that Neal's arranged in the middle of the aisle.

"Which ones are your favorites?" Peter asks.

"For the brown ones, I like these," Neal says, nudging a pair of leather shoes with a blue sock-clad foot. "But then I have to have sneakers, for gym, and so I think these ones are good?" Neal's less sure about this selection. His foot hovers between Nike and New Balance. Peter _hmmms_ and watches as attentively as he can while Neal parades down the aisle one more time in each pair, his small face drawn tight with concentration. By the time he's picked out three pairs—one for dressing up, one for gym, one for every day—Peter's ready to go.

He's picking up the boxes to carry to the register when he notices it. Neal's painfully familiar _I wonder if I could steal that..._ glance. Peter follows his line of sight.

Huh.

"Neal...do you want to try on the light-up shoes?"

Neal jumps and shakes his head.

The light-up shoes (which come in My Little Pony, Transformers, Barbie, and rainbow) aren't on sale, unlike the 'back to school' section the rest of his shoes had come from.

"I really think you should get a fourth pair," Peter says with a frown.

Neal's eyes flicker between Peter and a box of Transformer shoes (with—what, lightbulbs? stuck in the heels).

"I don't need them," Neal says softly, taking a tiny step towards the rack.

"Definitely another pair," Elizabeth says sagely, nodding along. "What if you're walking Satchmo at night, and he wanders away? This way, he'll be able to see you, and come back."

Neal's squinting suspiciously at them. They're neither of them very subtle.

"Just try on the da—dang shoes," Peter says, shoving Neal's shoulder gently.

Neal decides on the rainbow light-up shoes. He carries that box out himself.

*

“Nice fairy shoes,” says Uncle Mike, who’s Peter’s brother and not really Neal’s uncle, when Neal reaches for his light-up sneakers. “I bet the other kids give you a lot of shit for those, huh? Elizabeth must have picked them out for you.” Uncle Mike chuckles and Neal puts them down quickly and grabs his gym shoes. They’re better for going out in the cold anyway. Better for walking. Um. Better. “And I think you grabbed Elizabeth’s scarf by mistake, kiddo.”

Uncle Mike tells him not to be a girl and punches him on the shoulder (just lightly, just a joke), and Neal’s lungs close up for a second. He’d been doing really good. “Now put it back so we can go,” Mike says. Neal glances down at the scarf in his hands (it’s pink and one of the softest things he’s ever felt) and quickly puts it back on the coat rack.

“I wasn’t going to steal it,” he says. He really wasn’t.

“I didn’t think you were,” Mike says. “You just don’t want anyone to think you’re a…well, a sissy, do you?”

“This is mine,” he lies, grabbing one of Peter’s scarves. “This is the one I meant to take.” Mike grabs Satchmo’s leash and ruffles Neal’s hair.

Neal wraps the scarf around his neck and quietly follows Mike out the door.

He is quiet on the walk and quiet when they get home.

*

Mike is staying for a week. Neal is sleeping on the couch, because Mike has a bad back and needs the bed. Neal doesn’t like it in the living room. The window is too big, and Satchmo sticks his nose in Neal’s face when he’s trying to sleep.

Neal is different. Which he knows, which he’s _always_ known. He’d thought that he was different because of money and because of his mom, but here, now, with Peter and Elizabeth, and money and no mom, he is still different. Sometimes the other kids talk and he doesn’t know what they’re saying, and sometimes he doesn’t care about the things they’re talking about, and sometimes they’re talking about him. He tells himself that it dosn't. 

*

He crosses Elizabeth’s scarf off the list of things that he wants to take back home with him.

*

He gets rid of his pink and purple crayons. Hides them in a drawer, because he’s not going to throw them away, because he’s going to run out of all the other colors at some point, and it’s better to have girly colors than no colors at all. Probably.

*

He stops wearing his light-up shoes. Tabitha, who is in his class, also has light up shoes; hers have Pocahontas on them.

*

He steals one of the pictures from the living room (and he feels bad about the stealing, because Peter and Elizabeth will run out of money some day, he can’t keep taking things from them) and studies it. Neal in the picture is wearing a suit, and black shoes, and Peter has his arm over his shoulders and Neal has his arm around Elizabeth’s waist and they’re all smiling.

He keeps the picture hidden in the couch. He’ll put it back, when Uncle Mike leaves and Neal gets his room—the guest room—back.

*

“The kid should join a sports team,” Uncle Mike says over dinner. Peter leans back in his chair and looks at Neal. It’s easy to see how they’re related, when they’re both staring at him, both of them trying to figure out what to do with Neal, how to make him fit. Uncle Mike’s big, bigger than Peter, and his arms are hairy and he talks about sports all the time.

“It might be good for you,” Peter says, so Neal nods quickly.

“He can’t,” Elizabeth says. “The art club meets at the same time as the school sports teams. It’s a shame that they’ve organized it that way.”

“I don’t want to be in art club,” Neal says, not looking Elizabeth or Peter in the face. “I want to play sports.”

He does not want to play sports. He’s seen football. Elizabeth and Peter watch it on their gigantic flat TV, and the players spend the whole time hitting each other. Neal’s small, he knows that, Uncle Mike calls him squirt and most of the kids in Neal’s class are taller than him. Maybe he can be the kicker on the football team. He is pretty sure that would still count.

“But you love art club,” Elizabeth protests.

“No, I don’t,” he says, in a voice that is too small. “It’s for—only girls are in the art club.” Girls and Neal and two other boys. One of them spends the whole time making messes, and the other boy, Brandon, is a—a sissy.

“That’s certainly a new attitude,” Peter says slowly. Neal sneaks a glance at him, because Peter doesn’t sound very happy that Neal’s trying to be more like him, more like Mike.

“Come on,” Mike says. “All my boys are in football. The kid just wants to fit in. If he doesn’t man up, he’s going to end up—well, you know.”

“No,” Elizabeth says, in a voice that makes Neal freeze on the inside. “I don’t know. Why don’t you explain it to me.” Elizabeth sounds _mean_ , mean in a way that Neal didn’t know she could be; he’d gotten used to her being soft and kind and not at all like Neal’s other—like Neal’s mom. He hopes she’s mad _because_ of Neal, not _at_ him.

Mike sighs and puts his napkin down on the table, sitting forward and looking Elizabeth right in the eyes. “I’m not trying to be un-PC,” he says, waving his hands in the air. Neal’s not sure what PC is, because Diana had told him it meant computer, and that doesn’t really make sense here; Uncle Mike is anything but predictable the way computers are. “I’m just saying, the boy’s got…tendencies. And it’s going to be rough on him if someone doesn’t make sure that he straightens up. I’m just thinking of him. I’ve got kids, you understand, I know how they can be. I’m only—”

“Neal.” Peter’s looking at him. Neal shrinks in his chair and thinks about running. “You shouldn’t—”

“I’ll play sports,” he interrupts, trying to sound strong. “I can do it, I can be like I am when I grow up, I just haven’t…I don’t know how yet.” No one will tell him. He wants to fix himself, he wants to be the person that Peter and Elizabeth like and hug and invite over for dinner, instead of a wimpy kid who doesn’t want to get hit or run around in the sun or wear boring scarves.

“Be quiet,” Peter says. Neal shuts his mouth so quickly that his teeth clack. “Mike, I swear to god, if you say one more word about this, I will physically throw you out of this house. This is not your family. It is not your place. Now, here’s what’s going to happen. Elizabeth—can you get the dessert out?” She nods. “Great. Neal, you can help with that. I’m going to call some hotels and make Mike a reservation. A cab will be here within the hour. You better get moving,” Peter says, after a long pause where Neal’s pretty sure that no one breathes. “If you don’t start packing, you won’t be ready in time.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“I want you out of my house,” Peter says, his voice in a hiss like a giant snake, too smooth to be a growl. Neal doesn’t understand what Peter’s doing, because Mike’s his family and Neal’s _not_.

“Take a breath,” Mike says with a slow smile, standing up and holding his hands out in front of him, as if those are the only weapons he has that can hurt people. Peter stands up and gets between Mike and Neal. They look like they’re playing cowboys and Indians, only without the guns; they don’t look like brothers anymore.

Seconds later Elizabeth pulls Neal out of his chair and ushers him into the kitchen. Half of him thinks he’s going to get spanked, and the other half thinks Peter and Mike are going to get into a fight, and some other small part of him that is too strange to be part of his fractions feels like dying.

“I’m sorry,” he says. He starts crying and then Peter and Mike start yelling, and Satchmo’s barking. Elizabeth picks him up, which he’s too big for, he’s a big kid, he’s _strong_ and he could play football if he wanted to, if Peter and Elizabeth wanted him to. The small part of him that is too sad for fractions takes over and wraps his arms and legs around Elizabeth’s shoulders and waist and lets her carry him out to the backyard, where all the sounds from the house are muffled and the crickets are singing.

Elizabeth sets him down in one of the lawn chairs and crouches down in front of him. “Has Uncle Mike been talking to you about this stuff?” she says. She sounds like Elizabeth again.

He nods. She wipes the tears off his cheeks and smiles at him when he sniffles. “You are perfect,” she says, which makes Neal wrinkle his face at her because, no, he’s not. “And we will love you whether you are in art club or if you play football. Or if you don’t do either. And we will love you if you—we’ll love you no matter what clothes you wear, or how you act, or who you…who you’re friends with.”

“No you won’t,” he whispers. Mike and Peter have stopped yelling. They must have made up.

“Why do you think that?”

He tries to figure out how to say it. How to explain that sometimes Neal wants clothes in the store that are in the section where the girls are supposed to shop, and how other kids and grownups look at him funny, and how Neal’s not _stupid_.

“There’s these guys,” he tells her slowly, “who lived in the building with me and my mom.” He stares at his feet. He’s in his socks. They’re plain and white and going to get stained from the grass. “Everyone made fun of them,” he whispers. Neal’s mom had made fun of them. The other kids down the hall had thrown eggs at their balcony. Neal had thrown eggs at their balcony, even before he’d figured out what it meant. Sissy boys like other boys. Boys aren’t supposed to like other boys.

“Sometimes people can be mean,” Elizabeth says.

Uncle Mike hadn’t been mean. He’d tried to help Neal. “I dunno,” he says, staring at her knees.

“Peter was in art club,” she reminds him. He nods. “So was your uncle Moz. And Moz doesn’t play any sports, and you still like him, right?” He nods again. “And you know Diana?” He nods; of course he knows Diana. “Have you met her girlfriend?”

He stares at her, his eyes so wide they hurt a bit. “Her what?”

“Diana likes other girls,” Elizabeth says. “And she played sports when she was in school. And you like her, right?”

He thinks about it. Of course he likes Diana, even if sometimes she’s a bit scary. Peter and Elizabeth certainly like her. There are pictures of Diana in their house. And Diana sometimes acts like a boy instead of a girl, and she likes girls and not boys—

A door slams, and a minute later Peter comes out into the backyard. “He’s gone,” Peter says shortly. Then Peter’s picking Neal up and hugging him so tight he can’t breathe. “I’m so sorry,” Peter says, rocking Neal from side to side. “He should not have said those things to you. I shouldn’t have let him do that to you.”

Neal can feel himself shutting down. Too much is happening. He’s cold and tired and his stomach feels sick and this is too much, too much to understand.

Neal lets Peter carry him back inside so that he won’t stain his socks. They move him back into the guest room—his room. Elizabeth finds the picture he’d hidden in the couch, and Peter says that he can keep it.

*

A week later, he puts the pink and purple crayons back in his box, and sticks his tongue out at Danny when he makes fun of Neal during recess for drawing pictures of all flowers.

*

He asks Elizabeth for her scarf, and she wraps it around his neck and kisses him on the top of his head. “Perfect,” she says. Neal smiles into the soft fabric of the scarf and doesn’t disagree.


End file.
